Noticias

Transformation optics allows one to design electromagnetic media to modify the trajectory of light in complex ways, as in an invisibility cloak. In this approach, an electromagnetic field undergoes a rotation and scaling, which restricts the achievable functionalities.

What if there were another way? In their paper “Nontensorial Transformation Optics”, Carlos García-Meca (Nanophotonics Technology Center) and Carlos Barceló (Institute of Astrophysics of Andalusia) present an alternative transformation theory that preserves a field’s orientation and amplitude, allowing a variety of effects and applications unreachable by standard transformation optics. This includes devices that feel no local electromagnetic force, reflectionless light compressors, optical modes with arbitrary in-plane polarization, and special isolators.

The work has been published in Phys. Rev. Appl. and has been selected as an editors’ suggestion.